


time/timeless/no time

by KilltheRhythm



Category: Football RPF
Genre: Fluff, I'm not good at writing forwards I swear this is better than it looks ok, M/M, i have so many other things half done and yet I find the time to write this, slight angst, sorta fluff I guess, title comes from a Walter de Maria work
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-25
Updated: 2016-10-25
Packaged: 2018-08-24 13:42:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8374300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KilltheRhythm/pseuds/KilltheRhythm
Summary: The aftermath of the Ingolstadt game; or the difference between how Auba sees things and how Felix and Christian do.





	

Auba locks his jaw in place for seemingly the thousandth time on his way to the parking lot. Fuck this game, fuck ingolstadt, fuck not winning against the damn lowest ranked team. It's a mantra in his head that continues as he gets in the car, stays as he drives.

He tries drowning it out with music, but listening to anything makes him angrier. The drive is long and silent, and despite the fact that it is colder than he'd like outside he drives with the windows down and the heater off, swift-moving air whipping around him and chilling his throat.

When he finally gets home, he kicks off his shoes and wanders around aimlessly. He finds himself sitting down on the tile of his kitchen, cold emanating from it through his track pants, and his blood is seemingly solid ice and time has frozen too. The tick of the clock on the wall and the simple hum of the refrigerator and his breath are the only sounds in the static air.

"fuck," he mumbles because it sums up all of his day. His phone, sitting on the table just a pace away, then lights up as if in response to his swear.

He knows it's Marco even though the ringer is off, the eerily good timing tips him off. He'd rather be alone right now, but he still finds himself moving to pick up the phone, accept the call, say hello through a half frozen windpipe.

Marco doesn't bother with a "how are you" or a "it's gonna be alright" over the phone. He knows Auba too well for that, is too close for false formalities. Instead all Auba gets is "Unlock your door, I'll be there in five."

I'd rather be alone, Auba thinks to himself, but still walks back to the door, unlocks it, tidies up the house as much as possible. He peers into the bathroom mirror for a second, and frowns because he looks as miserable as he feels. Decides to pull on a near-offensively orange beanie in the slightest of hopes of it brightening up his look.

Marco waltzes in with a plastic takeaway bag marked "thank you" on it, styrofoam containers inside of it. He smiles the tiniest of smiles, stubble moving with the rest of his face. "Hey, I brought food."

Auba smiles back, and he doesn't need to ask what type of food it is or ask to know what's going on. It's seemingly some tradition, getting Chinese food after a shit night. They end up sitting down right back where Auba was before, but the hum of the refrigerator and the tick of the clock and coldness of the tiles are seemingly nonexistent now. Marco is blonde and golden, warm and light in the cold and mostly unlit house.

"Don't beat yourself up over it too much." Marco says between mouthfuls of the shitty fried rice that must have cost half a euro more to add on. Auba nods, thoughtfully, because he's thankful that Marco didn't say "it's just a tie, could be worse". Marco gets things.

Auba motions with his fork to Marco as he speaks. "I won't, but you can't either over the whole Mario thing."

Marco looks down at his food, pushing it around with chopsticks. He remembers when the roles were reversed, hearing about Mario rejoining. (It had ended up much like this, consulting with Auba over dingy Chinese food, sitting on the living room floor of Marco's house at 12AM.

"You can't avoid him forever, just because you had a falling out." Auba had said.

Marco had looked even more indignant, shook his head. "Watch me. I'm not gonna bother with his shit this time," and Auba rolled his eyes.)

Marco is swift to change the subject back. "That was a damn good goal for Christian though." Auba smiles, nods, and thinks that yes, maybe things could have gone worse.

\----

Everything and everyone is screaming, and maybe Christian is too. He's not sure where the sound is coming from exactly, but fuck everything is so great, and first he is running and it's in and his thoughts are all run on sentences. Felix slams himself into him, and then they're both on the ground tangled together, grinning and Ousmane is there too.

Tuchel screams at them then to get up, and then again later after the game because the team was shit. Lucky that they tied, he said, but all Christian can think about is that for once he tied it up, he and Felix did it, just them.

After finally being released from that long, damned post-game talk, Cristian, Felix and Ousmane wander off to a restaurant. Arguing over where to go, they finally drive past a Thai restaurant and are too hungry to go further.

Over food that is a little too spicy for all of them, they discuss the game, upcoming Halloween, the girl that works at the small grocery store not too far from the training ground that Ousmane thinks is pretty, and finally, why there were so many footballers with the last name Dembele (Felix and Christian proclaim him the best Dembele, much to their friend's chagrin). Their conversation is a mix of German and English, and Christian thinks that this is the closest that he's felt to home since he moved to Germany. He wonders if the French teen sitting across from Felix and him feels the same.

After dropping off Ousmane, Felix turns to smile at Christian, a bright look the American thinks he's seen a thousand times over, but it never gets old. "I found this cool place, wanna go?"

Christian nods and lets Felix drive, wondering why his friend is being so vague. He watches as they slowly drive out of the city, turn onto country roads and see the buildings become less common. Unsure if Felix knows exactly where he's going or if this is another one of his "great ideas".

He's so deep in thought that he barely noticed the radio playing. Felix must have turned it on at some point, but it's set to a station that Christian has never even heard of, and it's playing a kind of music that he's almost completely sure that Felix does not listen to. Chords strummed on guitars that were built quite possibly a century before he was born play, and voices of singers long dead quietly go through their songs. Christian wonders why a radio station in Germany was playing old American blues.

When they get there though, that's when he knows Felix isn't kidding. He can't see much anything of interest as Felix parks the car on the side of the road, just tall pine trees mixed in with bushes and long grass, but as they walk further and further off the road, the landscape opens up.

Under the late evening light, the pink sky illuminates the canyon-esque deep hole in the ground. Christian can hear the words "abandoned quarry" come out of Felix's mouth, but he's more preoccupied with staring at the sheets and blocks of marbled pale rock shining with the setting sun. The pines and deciduous trees seemingly bend towards the giant drop in the earth, and the grass sways with the wind as if in awe at the very majesty of the earth beneath their feet.

"Wow." Christian says, still staring. He'd have to tell his parents about this later. Felix looks incredibly proud of himself, face beaming as he sits down at the edge of the cliff side, legs dangling and kicking above the massive chasm.

\----

Marco thumbs over the remote quickly, flicking through Netflix. Auba sits on the couch quietly next to him, debating over what they should watch. The Gabonese man is far less grumpy now, out of his funk. Marco knows he's the one responsible for it, and even though there is no one to brag to, he feels a wave of pride.

"How about batman?" He and Auba both suggest at the same time, then turn to face each other. When their eyes meet they laugh, Auba's head tilted back and mouth open, Marco leaning forward and eyes closed.

"Original batman?" Auba asks, and Marco has never searched something that fast. The film is the perfect combination of godawful and hilarious, with all of the gay innuendos Marco could ever want.

Auba and Marco seemingly grows closer throughout the film, until Marco is actually half on top of his friend, can feel when he's laughing or when he tenses up.

"Not so sulky now?" He half murmurs, half teases after Auba laughs particularly loudly. The man underneath him shoots him a knowing look, but it's not serious. Auba isn't serious when he doesn't need to be.

"How are you not laughing?" Auba asks, which is a good question, because the whole scene they're watching is completely ridiculous.

Marco contemplates it for a while, wonders why he wasn't laughing, but decides it doesn't matter, because there are more important at hand things than what is going on onscreen. Auba is there, warm and pleasant, and it's all he could ask for.

"It's so gay." Auba mumbles, and Marco nods, it's true, there is an eerily large number of innuendos in the film.

Marco resists the urge to instantly say "but we're so gay", because he'd learned a long time ago in school that showing is better than telling, and that's never been much of a problem for him. He dips his head to meet Auba's, eyes closed and the least chaste of thoughts on his mind.

\----

"How did you find this?" Christian asks, laying so deeply in the grass that he fears that maybe he'll take root too, become the earth and stay here forever.

"I got lost out here when I first learned how to drive." Felix says, more subdued than normal. He lies in the grass right next to Christian, close enough for their elbows to touch.

"Good find." Christian says, tilting his head slightly so he can see both the quarry and Felix. His friend has done the same, shifting just enough to be better poised for conversation. He finds himself wondering why they didn't invite Ousmane here, but Felix hadn't mentioned him in the past hour, so he lets the teenager be a relic of the earlier day, not present in the now.

At some point their conversation drifts apart, but Felix glides a hand over Christian's and it stays there, so he takes it as a cue that all is well.

They both wake up with horrible cricks in their necks and backs, and Christian wonders what he did to generate such a pain, until he opens his eyes fully and realizes that it's because they slept outside on hard rock.

Felix cards a hand through his hair and yawns the largest yawn physically possible, body stretched and mouth left wide. Christian's hand is a little warmer than the rest of his body; realizes that he must have kept his hand with Felix's for longer than remembered. There's no conversation, just smiling and shared memories of scoring the equalizer yesterday, and that's more than enough for now for Felix.

He wonders if it's love though, as they sit in a restaurant that doesn't seem to have the American breakfast that Christian is looking for. Warmth in his chest and a grin ever present on his face in the presence of the ever-so-slightly shorter than him teen. What more could you want?

"We have training in like an hour," Christian says, ever the more responsible one of the two (though with Felix, it's hard not to be the more responsible one). Felix nods absentmindedly, wondering if Christian feels the same or if it's just him, choked up about God knows what.

The American presses up next to him on the car ride home, and Felix thinks he knows the answer to his own question. "God bless my life," he finds himself saying, and things couldn't get much better for him.

\----

Auba wakes up on the couch with an abnormal heaviness on his chest. Slowly opening his eyes, he sees first only a blur, and then finally a mess of blonde hair. Auba groans and shuts his eyes again, trying to stretch himself out without causing his teammate to fall to the floor.

"Marco, move." He hisses, and tries to shake the man on top of him. Marco raises his head, floppy hair covering much of his mostly closed eyes.

"Hm?"

Auba wriggles his arms free and pushes on Marco's shoulders. "Get up you dumbass, you're crushing me."

Marco giggles and rolls over slightly, still more asleep than Auba. Auba gives him a faux-serious look, and Marco sighs, rolling more to the side, until he suddenly loses balance and flops onto the fuzzy carpet with a solid "oomph".

Auba looks down at the blonde, peering over the edge of the couch, and Marco looks up from the floor, with his hair finally out of his eyes, and they both start laughing. Once Marco can regain his composure, he pushes himself into a sitting position. "I was on you the entire night! Only now you're claiming I crushed you?"

Auba sits still for a second, tries to think of an innuendo that could be made, but it's too early for him to come up with any clever wordplay. Instead, he gets up off of the couch, helps Marco up, and offers to make breakfast.

Their discussion of the game was minimal during breakfast, only the two wondering how angry Tuchel would be at training. Marco thinks punishment laps would be instated (and of course mentions how "Mario'll complain so much, the fat fuck,". Auba takes great joy in calling him bitter, but is met with a knowing look and a "I love you, but let me be angry about this,"), and Auba just hopes that it'll be minimal.

As they get ready for training, Auba rifles through his dresser drawers to find his warmest pair of training pants. He has to go through quite possibly half of Marco's kit to get there, and wonders how much he had left at Marco's apartment if all of this was here. Their lives were good and tangled now, he thinks, but he wouldn't have it any other way.

Marco offers to drive, hair still flopping into his eyes because he was too lazy to use hair gel for the day. Auba shakes his head. "There's no way you're driving my baby."

Marco gets into the car in a fake huff, crossing his arms and pretending to be mad for the split second he could keep the act together. Auba rolls his eyes, his grievances of yesterday temporarily forgotten. Marco tended to have that effect on him.

He remembers them clear as day when he arrives, though. Marco pats his shoulder, tells him it's going to be fine, but shuts up pretty quickly. They've arrived early, with only a handful of people there. They walk around a bit to warm up, and pass by two of the youngest players.

Felix's hair is a bit of a mess, and Christian's shirt was more than wrinkled, but they turned to smile and wave at the older duo as they passed around the ball. Auba and Marco wave at them, and continue on their walk.

As they continue, Marco turns to face Auba, a small smile playing on his lips. "They remind you of us, don't they?" He pauses for a second to think, and then summons up his best poetic voice. "A partnership for the ages."

Auba shrugs, presses a hand into Marco's shoulder and turns back to watch the two teenagers play keep away. He shifts again to face Marco, smiles, and presses the side of his head to Marco's. "They'll be, I guess. I think we're better though."

Marco's smile is bright enough to light an entire town. Auba looks at him, and decides that this may be the most content he's been in his life. 

**Author's Note:**

> Wow I wrote this on a whim at 3am like the night after that game. Idk why there isn't any more Felix and Christian up on here, that celebration tackle was legendary.


End file.
